Ann Dromeda
by Imipak
Summary: Kim Possible stumbles across a new foe who stays in the shadows and hires criminal gangs and mind-controlled victims to do their work. How do you find or fight a foe nobody is sure even exists? Rated M for senseless violence, including sexual, and death.
1. Not All That Glitters

Standard Disclaimer: Disney owns Kim Possible, Rufus owns all the cheese, and I own the blank space between lines.

Chapter 1 – Not All That Glitters

Kim Possible arrived at history class to find there was a new student there. This new student looked wary and had a hunted but determined expression on her face. Kim's first thought was bullying, but it didn't look as though the other kids had noticed a new arrival yet. She made a mental note to try and talk to the new student, if only to establish if there was anything she should be concerned about.

On the lesson starting, Kim noticed one other thing, As the new student bent down to write, there was an ugly red line on the new student's neck that indicated to her a blade had been closer than desired some time in the recent past. Again, perhaps innocent, perhaps not. Kim refused to second-guess.

After a depressingly long class, they were finally released for lunch. Kim told Ron to go on ahead, that she would catch up shortly. Then, without appearing to do so, she got alongside the new student.

"Hi, err, I'm Kim, are you a new student here?"

The girl nervously smiled. "I'm Catherine. Yes, started today."

"Is there something wrong?"

Catherine stopped for a moment, took a deep breath and struggled inwardly for a moment before letting it out. "Does nearly being decapitated by a tribe of headhunters who have been paid to kill me count as wrong or weird?"

Kim's eyebrows rose. "Uhhhh... no offence but why would tribesmen be paid to kill you?"

Catherine pondered. "I help out on archaeology digs. I... might have found something. But I can tell you're skeptical. It's ok, everyone else thinks I'm crazy, you're in good company."

Being seen as dismissive and uncaring was a new one for Kim and it took her a moment to recover.

"Ah, well, it's just that..."

At that moment, the Kimmunicator beeped and Kim (together with Ron) headed off to another sitch. Catherine ate alone, absorbed in her own world. Nobody noticed, let alone bothered, her.

Next morning, she was woken to familiar chirping.

"Good morning Wade," she yawned, "what's the sitch?"

"That background check you asked me to run on Catherine Duncan? Turned up quite a bit. Her father, Patrick, is both an archaeologist and a radio astronomer."

"Strange mix."

"It gets stranger. Listen to this. Their plane crashed last year under mysterious circumstances and they were missing for five months. When they resurfaced, they refused medical attention but headed immediately to an island whose occupants are so dangerous, all contact is forbidden"

"When did they return?"

"Nobody seems quite sure. Catherine suddenly appears in Middleton three days ago, but there's no record of where she's staying. Nor is there any record of her entering the country. Her father might be in Australia, but if he is, nobody is talking."

Kim's brain ran out of red flags and was furiously dying all the other flags red to fill the need.

"I don't like the sound of this."

"Me neither. I'll let you know if I find out any more."

The new information indicated dangerous projects and maybe even headhunters but not necessarily paid killers or mysterious artefacts. That was going to require quite a lot more. Further, if Catherine was in the country illegally, Kim felt some moral obligation to notify someone. That terrified look, though, gave her pause. She would give Catherine a chance to prove there was a legitimate concern and legitimate reason to be there.

However, that day was busy. So she decided to wait until after school to trail Catherine home and talk there. Maybe in a safer environment, she'd be more honest and open. Ron, of course, came along too. That limited stealth, but Catherine seemed not to notice. Or, if she did, she didn't care.

Catherine got off the bus on the edge of some farmland at one of the outermost stops. Quickly, she moved through woodlands to what looked like an old abandoned barn. Opening the door, she slipped inside.

Kim could understand trespass in times of need, but it would not bode well for Catherine if there was no need. Following carefully, she glanced into the barn. There was Catherine, together with a younger girl who might have been a sister. They were eating a stew, using tree bark as bowl-plates. Next to the cooking pot was a stack of stinging nettles, a pile of acorns, a greyish powder, assorted weeds and the remains of a couple of crows.

Kim Possible tried hard not to vomit at the sight. This was well below survival needs and crow had a reputation for being the worst, the most disgusting, wild food that could humanly still be called edible. She could hear Ron going outside. Her suspicion wasn't lessened but it was diluted by pity over this desperate bid for survival.

Her attention was, however, sidetracked as a series of explosions opened up part of the opposite wall. Gunmen poured in, firing wildly. Kim threw herself to the ground and hoped Ron had as well. There was nothing else she could do, such was the chatter of automatic weapons.

Some of the bullets struck an old stack of fuel cans. They exploded into flame, which spread rapidly in the bone-dry straw. The attackers let off a couple more bursts, then fled.

Kim, however, had people to save. She ran to where the two girls had been eating. The younger girl was missing half of her head and a good portion her body was riddled with holes. Blood and brain matter was everywhere. Catherine, burned, wounded, in shock and cowering, was still alive. Kim pulled her up from the floor, kicked away the rotten side planking, and dragged them both to safety. Working their way around to the front, they found a hysterical Ron who was convinced Kim had been killed.

"Ron! It's me! I'm still alive and ok!"

Sobbing, Ron held onto Kim for an embarrassing few minutes. In that time, Kim had called Wade and had him notify the police and fire departments after he'd checked that all radar indicated the intruders had left. She had also called her mother.

"Mom, I have a sitch."

"A boy?"

"No, a homeless teen whose sister was murdered in front of her and who is now in deep shock."

There was a pause followed by a sigh.

"Kimmy, boys would be easier. Please and thank you. Are you taking her to the hospital?"

"If someone's trying to kill her, that might not be a good idea."

There was another pause.

"How much does she have to bring with her?"

"What's left of what's on her back and some trauma."

"Are her attackers still around?"

"Wade doesn't think so. I'm going to scout round in case. Ron can look after Catherine."

Ten minutes later and the Possibles' car drove up. Kim had returned - no sign of anyone - but it was obvious the attackers would figure out someone had survived when the media was filled with reports and they mentioned only one body. She therefore made sure the police and fire crews were ok with leaving her name off the police reports this one time. It wasn't officially witness protection, but they trusted Kim's judgement on the danger.

Conveying the injured girl to the car was the easy part. The clothes had partially burned onto the skin and that meant using burn-safe padding. Given the twins' passion for in-house rocketry, the car was fairly well stocked on treatments and padding for burns, along with blankets for incidental shock victims.

What proved much harder for Kim and Ron was dealing with a girl slipping in and out of shock, as this made it harder to process their own emotions. Ron had not seen the murder, but what he had seen together with everything he'd heard and been told was going to give him a sleepless night.

Kim's support network was better but this was a very different scenario and she suspected she was going to need to ask her mother for a knock-out drop, a capsule she took when sanity was not an option. A rare occurrence, but not unknown. Ann Possible also had drugs for counteracting trauma. Those were only effective if taken within about an hour of the event, but this shock was recent enough.

Mrs Possible provided Kim and Ron with the needed capsules, and broke open one of each over a glass of water she was taking to Catherine. They were going to need their strength and sanity, and a mild deviation from official policy in the name of medical ethics wasn't going to kill anyone.

The next day, Ann Possible took the first day of sick leave in three years. There was speculation but none of it accurate or, indeed, malicious. The news had talked of a disaster, after all.

During that time, she stretched medical ethics to its limit to provide the pain relief and anxiety treatment needed, particularly after carefully removing the burned remnants of Catherine's garments - along with rather too much charred flesh. Life and death was in the balance and this was a battle Mrs Dr Possible was absolutely determined to win.

After that day came the weekend. It wasn't until Sunday night that Anne felt Kim could safely question Catherine. She contacted Wade, then set the Kimmunicator to silent so Wade could listen in and look up anything that might be of interest.

"Catherine? Are you awake?"

Catherine slowly turned her head, her eyes showing the agony but her expression betraying none of it. Kim had been impressed by Catherine's determination all weekend. That, together with the attack, had led her to think she'd misjudged Catherine.

"Who are trying to kill you? What was the artefact you found?"

Catherine's inner battle raged, to tell and risk or to keep some things hidden. In the end, she realized she had to pass the information on or risk the wrong people learning of it.

"There's a mystic criminal... oh, you probably think that's rubbish..."

"I've dealt with one of two of those," Kim said dryly.

Catherine blinked, then said slowly "you might understand this, then. There is this person. Ann Dromeda. She is a mystic who wants to become a demigod."

Kim nodded, so Catherine continued.

"We, my dad and I, have been excavating a series of ruined shrines. Each one contained a tablet with an inscription in an unknown language and a second tablet in an archaic form of one we did know. The one we could read provided a little information and instructions on how to find the next. There seem to have been twenty-seven shrines in all, we found only ten. That might just be enough, though."

"Enough? For what?"

"The information suggests that the full set of tablets, if you follow the text we couldn't read, would make you immortal and godlike in intelligence and strength. As long as we have the tablets, they can't complete the ritual to do this. The rest is useless to them. So we're keeping them hidden."

"In a safe place, I hope."

"Several. Dad has half of them, I have half."

"How did you find them in the first place?"

"We were looking up ancient star maps, ancient people recorded the stars a lot. That was part of dad's astronomy. Stars sometimes die and if you find a star map where there's a star missing, well, chances are there's something dark there that you can only see if you know where to look. Also, there's only a few places where any given star map could have been drawn, because of mountains, latitude and stuff, and only a few times because stars move relative to each other."

Kim was nodding not because she understood any of it but because Wade would and because she wanted to keep Catherine talking. It would keep her from thinking about recent events too much.

"We found some maps that were drawn in the wrong places and at the wrong time."

"Wait, what? What do you mean?"

"They're all from a long chain of islands in the southern hemisphere that didn't use tablets, or even writing, and weren't known about by the people in Siberia where the tablets were found. Nobody in Siberia used shrines that far back, but they were found in shrine that matched the shrines in the islands we found the ritual tablets in. Someone went to a lot of trouble to protect the secret."

"If these people are after the tablets, why are they trying to kill you?"

"Well, they know I won't talk and they know the tablets aren't on me, so I guess they don't want me moving them. They then have all the time to look."

Kim wasn't convinced but it was a starting point.

"What about your father?"

"We agreed no contact, so that if they found one of us the other still had a chance. I have no idea where he is or if he's alive."

That sounded depressing, but Kim had some sympathy for the problem. The tactic was crude and likely ineffective but two desperate people with no understanding of how to avoid a danger are going to try something and at least there was some rationale behind it.

"When did you last see him?"

"About a month ago. We split up in Johannesburg, South Africa. The idea was to mingle with crowds and get ourselves lost, then head out solo in the bush. We both knew enough bushcraft to last a while, before getting lost in crowds elsewhere. No paper trail between places. It was a gamble, but nothing else we had tried had worked."

Kim didn't mention that obviously this hadn't worked either. She tried changing tack. "So who is this Ann Dromeda?"

"I don't know much. We have the name by chance. Two people walking near a cave we had been excavating mentioned that an Ann Dromeda was after some people with tablets. One of them led an attempt to kill us in our camp a few days later, so we were sure that we were the people being discussed."

Kim frowned. "I need to get you your medicine, but I'll see what I can find out while I'm gone."

Catherine looked so utterly defeated and exhausted that Kim was concerned that help would be limited to finding this Ann Dromeda and maybe ensuring Catherine was buried decently. She was honestly not sure Catherine wanted to pull through, for all that she held her mother's talents in high regard.

Once away from the guest room, she turned up the sound on the Kimmunicator. "Did you hear all that?"

"Yes!" exclaimed Wade. "I've checked every database I can find, there are repeated references to a shadowy Ann Dromeda but nobody knows who she is or if she's even real. Everything linked to her has been traced to one or another of the criminal masterminds, but never to a single person. GJ think it's a name of a consortium, but they can't prove that either."

Kim was not impressed by GJ theorizing, they'd once believed Ron was the secret ingredient in Team Possible. Ron wasn't the secret anything of anything. Ron and secrets didn't mix. Another time, they thought cheese gave rodents superpowers.

"Any lead on the attackers?"

"Yes. Within hours of the police saying there was only one body, twenty henchmen were found dead in an abandoned shop. They'd been beheaded."

Kim was all for limiting deaths of henchmen. She accepted that in a self-destructing base, you didn't have time to head-count who had got out and you were usually a little busy running to offer help, but that was accidental not intentional. So for twenty to die, for no good reason as far as she was concerned, was a body-blow. These couldn't be passed off as unavoidable due to the nature of evil lairs and their security arrangements. But why beheaded?

Wade didn't know but was looking into that. The greenish tinge to his face suggested he'd had to look into something very different after reading the reports. She disconnected the call.

Ok, she was facing a mysterious master-super-villain who hired super-villains and then eliminated traces. So not good and so very much the drama.

By the time she'd got the medicine and settled Catherine down, she got a beep.

"The Australian Air Force wants you to deal with someone who has stolen a top secret set of plans."

"Any idea what sort of plans?"

"No, I... errr."

"Checked their computer systems to find out?"

"Yes. There's no record of them"

Kim was not normally suspicious, but the timing of an Australian operation was, well, suspicious and the fact that Wade had found nothing doubly so. Still, she arranged transport and got Ron, as usual.

Once at the air base, her suspicions were roused further. Apparently, the thief had some sort of mind control device and they'd need to install an implant in them to prevent them being taken over.

Faking an excuse, she got to the bathroom and called Wade, who agreed to monitor things through the Kimmunicator. That settled, she returned only slightly paranoid.

"Ok, give us whatever it is."

The whatever it is turned out to be a tiny microchip implanted behind each year. They didn't feel any different afterwards and forgot about it. Wade, however, continued monitoring.

They were dropped outside of a radio astronomy facility. Kim felt this should mean something but had trouble remembering. As they entered the building, they saw there were no guards and no security measures. This was not the usual arrangement of a thief. She failed to notice Wade trying to get her attention.

"This is too easy", whispered Ron.

"Agreed!" came the reply.

They crept into the control room, where there was one man operating the controls. He was not paying them any attention, if he had heard them at all.

Kim rushed the man and knocked him out. She felt a sudden urge to kill him and run, but fought it back. That would have to wait. She needed to know where the stolen thing was.

Alarms suddenly went off and Kim broke from her trance. Noticing the Kimmunicator for the first time in a while, she grabbed it. "It can't be self destruct!" she shouted. Suddenly the alarms cut.

"No, that was me", said Wade. "You've been under mind control and now you're under an aerial attack. Bombers are closing in on your position with orders to destroy."

Kim blinked. People attempting to destroy her wasn't unusual, but it was usually the people she was trying to catch and not the people who had sent her in the first place.

She looked around and noticed a hatch leading underground. "It's our only chance! Help me death him there."

"But he's evil!"

"Just do it!"

They dropped him down a fairly long shaft, they had no choice, and had just closed and locked the hatch when bombs started falling.

At the bottom of the shaft, they'd found a thick layer of crash mats. They also found the man had sustained a broken leg but nothing worse. There was a door off the shaft into what looked like a bomb shelter. They dragged the man into that as well, then closed the door there.

The vibrations from the bombs were less and their minds felt clearer than ever. A search yielded basic first aid supplies, a little food, some water and a pen knife, but nothing more. Certainly nothing that could be called a secret and nothing that was likely stolen.

"Wade, can you wake him up safely? I think this could be important."

The screen was distorted but she should see Wade give the thumbs up. A couple of electrodes snuck out of the Kimmunicator and attached themselves to the unconscious man. A quick jolt and they heard him stirring.

It took a while for him to revive, but when he did, Kim asked the question that had started bugging her when she entered the shelter.

"Can you tell us your name?"

The man looked brightly up at Kim. "The name's Patrick. Patrick Duncan. And you are?"

Kim nodded, her suspicions confirmed. "Kim Possible."

Ron butted in. "And her friend Ron Stoppable!"

"You don't look like the usual assassins we get around here."

Kim smiled ruefully. "They gave us implants."

"Where did they put them, if it's not too embarrassing?"

"Behind the ears."

"Deep or something you can remove yourself?"

Kim spoke into the Kimmunicator. "Can we remove the implants safely?"

She could make out that he wanted her to scan them. She scanned Ron's, then had him scan hers.

"Just lift them out gently on a knife blade." was his advice.

She wasn't sure about Ron's skills but this man seemed familiar with them. She handed him the pen knife and knelt to make it easy for him. She was not comfortable for those few minutes, she had never turned her back on a knife-wielding suspect before and wasn't inclined to make a practice of it.

Once her implant was removed, it was Ron's turn. It was no easier for him.

Once done, she sat by the man. "I really am sorry for attacking you. I didn't mean to."

"I suspect you did a few things not in your nature with these implants. You are not to blame if others break into your mind like that."

Kim nodded. She was familiar with mind control devices. "What is this place? It's not just a bomb shelter, is it?"

"No, it's engineered to passively jam this sort of mind control."

"Passive jam?" asked Ron. "Is that like strawberry jam? I was attacked once by an angry rack of strawberry jam. It was at camp."

"Ron! Focus!"

Patrick grinned. "No, not like strawberry jam. It just means it doesn't use power, it can't be hacked and it can't be detected. I'm sorry if I'm having trouble placing your name, I've had a chaotic time recently."

"Your daughter told me."

Patrick looked up in alarm.

"It's ok, she's not well but she's safe."

"You said daughter..."

Kim sighed. This was really not the best time. "I'm sorry, her younger sister was killed by gunmen, she survived and is safe."

Patrick frowned.

"If the reason they picked you is because they know about your connection..."

Ron gulped and Kim blanched. "Wade?"

"On it." The Kimmunicator went blank. A very long and painful minute passed before it beeped."Go, Wade!"

"Everything's ok there, but Jim and Tim are arming some rockets."

"I'm not sure who should be more worried."

Wade smirked and cut the connection.

Ron had got up and checked the door they'd come through. It opened inwards and revealed... The way out was completely blocked with rubble. "The entire building is probably rubble..."

"Errr, KP, how are we going to get out? It's Bueno Nacho's half price extravaganza tonight!"

"There might be a few more important reasons for getting out."

"Nothing is more important than half price nacos."

Patrick shook his head in amazement, then pointed out the side doors. "One of those should work."

The first one revealed a collapsed tunnel and an unexploded bomb. They decided to try the other and return to that one only if necessary. It wasn't necessary. The second door yielded a corridor for maybe half a mile.

Between then, Ron and Kim carried Patrick along the corridor and up a gentle slope for another half mile. Ron was exhausted by the end of it, but didn't drop Patrick or slip, stumble or fall himself.

At the top of the slope there was a plastic hatch.

"Wait before opening. Can you scan the vicinity for people?"

Kim nodded. She called Wade and asked for a scan. The signal was much better here. Within moments, Wade shook his head and gestured to be quiet. A challenge for Ron, but one he managed without bragging about his silence skills first. He did that after Wade gave the all-clear, which annoyed Kim although she respected the fact that he managed to wait.

Once in the open, discovery would be a matter of time. However, Kim and Wade had figured they couldn't get a ride. Patrick thought for a moment, then offered a suggestion Kim would normally reject outright. Unless it involved the twins. Wade had monitored the control signals and the effect. All he had to do was generate his own control signal, aimed at some minor figure nobody would notice. They could borrow a covered jeep for the journey to somewhere else, say with an airfield.

This proved a lot easier said than done and Kim was deeply bothered by the ethics. She was also acutely aware that stealthy break-ins or breakouts were the province of criminals. It did not come naturally to her. After about ten minutes, however, a jeep was parked over the escape tunnel.

"Once the hatch is open, let the sand drain completely. It'll make it easier."

Kim nodded, also unhappy about taking direction. Especially as he knew thief-like tactics. Maybe both sides were up to no good. She would keep her eye on him.

The sand out, Patrick boosted Kim to the point where she could actually get out of the hole without sending down too much sand. She lowered a rope. With a little help from Ron, Patrick also made it out, followed by Ron. Rufus stayed in Ron's pocket, determined not to fall down the hole.

Wade motioned them to wait, then gestured for them to move quickly. Ron and Kim carried Patrick into the back, where the three lay under a tarpaulin. It wasn't a long wait. A man clambered in to the driver's seat, then drove off to the north-west. Within minutes, they reached a tiny shanty town. The driver got out and walked away. Kim had no idea how to drive this ancient vehicle, but followed Wade's instructions. It was kangaroo hopping at the start, and some gear changes suggested the gears might never work again, but they managed at last to get to a town with an airstrip.

Fortunately, one of the pilots had been rescued by Kim the previous year and flew them all to a research station just outside the rainforest. From there, Wade got them a ride to an international airport and back to America. That part was very much no big, with the small problem that Patrick was suffering from mild convulsions.

Kim reached out to the one person who could help.

"Mom! It looks like he's having seizures! What do I do?"

Her mother's image on the Kimmunicator stressed the problems the distances caused. An image is just an image.

"Can you do a brain scan with the Kimmunicator?"

"I don't know, I'll check with Wade."

A second call.

"Wade! I need to run a brain scan, with the results sent to mom!"

"On it!"

A light emitted from the front scanned Patrick's head, before going out. Moments later, Mrs Dr Possible called.

"There's not much you can do right now, he's had several shocks to the head recently and it looks like he's prone to this sort of problem. There may be a little bleeding on the brain, so you need to get him to a hospital quickly."

Kim bit her lip, hoping she was not, in some way, a cause of serious health problems. Guilty or innocent, that was not her style.


	2. Battlefront

Standard Disclaimer: Disney owns Kim Possible, Rufus owns all the cheese, and I own the blank space between lines.

Chapter 2 – Battlefront

Nearby hospitals were not exactly plentiful and if reports went out of a world-famous hero teen dragging in a severely injured radio astronomer, it might attract the wrong attention.

Kim's dilemma must have shown in her face, as Ann Possible asked the question that Kim had been reluctant to. "There's a problem, isn't there?"

"Yes. The mission was a fake. The ones who tried to kill Catherine's sister tried to kill Mr Duncan and tried to force me to help them."

"I hope you said no."

"They were using mind control."

Mrs Dr Possible sighed. Why couldn't the enemies be more normal, like the ones in the novel she was reading. Wasn't fiction supposed to be stranger than fact? She vaguely remembered a quote something like that. Obviously written by someone who didn't have a teen hero as a daughter.

"This sort of work is really too delicate for a field hospital, I'll see what I can arrange. Try to keep him comfortable."

Kim moved them into a patch of nearby woodland for some shelter - both from the heat and from unwanted eyes. Within an hour, Kim could hear vehicles driving nearby. People's voices coordinating the setting up of tents followed. A glance through the trees showed that circus tents were being set up. In the middle of nowhere?

Suspicious, she edged closer and saw that medical equipment was being taken into one of the side tents, from an ambulance someone had hurriedly spray-painted with bright, lurid colours.

The Kimmunicator beeped. It was her mother.

"One makeshift hospital. The circus is genuine, they have to practice somewhere, you need a bit of camouflage and they owe me... five favours. Circus people don't talk, so you should be ok."

After her brief conversation, Kim moved forwards and cautiously approached one of the medics. On being assured Wade had checked everyone for mind control, given that he now knew the frequency the implant was using, the two of them got Patrick to the surgical tent. He was not doing well, but the medic assured her that his chances were good.

The ringleader for the circus entered at that point. Introducing himself as Bill, he asked if there was anything he could do to help. Kim reckoned this was his way of paying off the remaining favours in one go. It was obvious they couldn't all hide in this one tent forever, but she had no idea how to solve that.

Of all people, it was Ron who had the idea. "Hey, Kim, you're around acrobats. You could practice your moves around them. As long as it was in circus clothes, nobody would recognize you!"

Kim thought about it. It had some appeal, she could learn a few new moves in exchange for some of hers that they might not know. It wouldn't give her favours to cash in, but if - as she hoped - she became a diplomat or Global Justice agent, it might be helpful to have friends in high-wire places. She inwardly groaned at her own pun. It was as bad as some of Ron's. She put her idea to Bill.

Bill thought about it. "Show me what you can do and I'll see if I can fit you in. No promises, we're one short on the acrobats but I gather from your mother that you're used to leading. A temporary leader would be a disaster for the act, even if they'd agree to it. Are you willing to be part of a troupe?"

Kim bit her lip. It came down to pride versus certain death for Patrick and maybe everyone else. Her pride was important, but was it all that important in this sitch? She had, after all, been an assistant to her mother with only stomach problems rather than control problems.

"Ok, show me where you want me to go."

Within the hour, it was agreed. She couldn't seem to be top billing or close to it, it would blow the disguise in addition to disrupting the troupe. Nor could she take training time from people who would continue on. However, she could learn all the different routines and she was already highly skilled at much. The trapeze and high wire were relatively new but really just extensions of things she had learned on her missions. Juggling flaming torches was not hard for her to pick up. The tumbling and back flipping she was already a master of.

But there were new routines. Dangling by a silk scarf seemed precarious, she preferred more solid anchors. It's one thing to form a human pyramid, but it's a little more terrifying to form it on the shoulders of someone bicycling along a high wire when you've no grappling hook to rescue you - the balance is different, as is the fact that the "floor" is moving. Strange new routines copied haphazardly from Cirque du Luneil. These last ones, she proved very helpful, using her knowledge of cheer routines to adapt the routines from mere copies to being something innovative in their own right.

When the proposed routines were rehearsed without a hitch, she knew there was real mutual respect and admiration. Their routines were far more dangerous than she had ever imagined and their bravery and skill that much greater. She didn't understand why so many felt rejected by the world, but she respected that they were too compassionate, too intelligent and too gifted to be seen as simply blaming others or being lazy. They worked harder in a day than Bonnie did in a month, as if their lives depended upon it. Which, in all fairness, they did.

Because they were good and put the effort in, it was easy for Kim to treat it the same way as she did when she helped her mother with brain surgery. The level of skill and precision was close enough the same.

Likewise, the circus folks warmed up to Kim quickly. They could trust that she'd save any of their lives if she could, if a routine went wrong, better than any netting. She was no wannabe, when it came to ability, and put in her share of the work. They knew she was hunted by killers and several of them knew from experience what that was like. And that new routine was going to draw crowds. It was a pity she would likely have left before the first public showing.

The time came when Patrick was healed up enough to fly transatlantic. Kim arranged a flight with Wade. A supersonic airliner was being tested and Wade had been able to arrange seats. Because this wasn't a regular flight, the three of them could limit the scrutiny and paperwork. This was convenient as Kim and Ron always had trouble explaining how they were leaving a country they never officially entered. Also, Patrick's passport was 250 feet under the collapsed remains of a radio observatory, give or take. The bomb craters made the surface very irregular.

Once back in the U.S., it was a short-haul flight to Middleton and a drive back to the Possibles' house. Catherine was waiting, still feeling the burns but able to move about a little. On her father entering she showed typical British stoic reserve. For all of about five seconds before collapsing into his arms.

"I was so worried about you dad, you shouldn't be allowed out on your own! You could have been killed!"

Patrick considered this for a moment. "I was in safe hands. Now, have you been doing your homework? It's probably late by now."

Kim and Ron exchanged puzzled glances and Patrick turned to them.

"It's a British way of dealing with shock. Substitute something less painful or, preferably, ridiculous for the trauma. Absurdly unhealthy, but it spreads out the pain and it does seem to work at least some of the time."

Catherine interjected. "Did they follow you?"

Patrick paused. "Quite possibly. You should not dismiss the possibility."

The joy in Catherine's eyes turn to terror. The few possessions she had that were not destroyed in the fire or too fused to flesh or clothes to free were in her pockets. She reached into one, grasped something tightly, then drew it out and handed it to Patrick.

It looked like a small handset, with some sort of finger holes at the back. Kim was puzzled by it but even more puzzled by Catherine's demeanour. Naked fear clashing with steeled resolve. A really bad combination, suggesting something of a suicide mission. Given the murderous opposition they had faced, that wasn't improbable.

"There's an old abandoned house by an airstrip, eight miles north of Middleton's boundary and three miles east", she whispered, although everyone could hear. "Less risk of innocent people getting hurt."

Kim wanted to scream no, you're not fit enough to walk to the car, let alone play hero, especially if you know you're going to get yourself killed! She could see the same reaction in both her parents and even Ron.

Patrick, however, was thinking things through. "Kim, can you call Wade?"

Kim quickly dialled up the boy genius and handed the Kimmunicator over.

"Wade, I need to know two things. I've some quantum wormhole tracking devices. It may be possible to goad Ann Dromeda into sending an assassin directly. That's our chance of finding out where she is located and something about her. This time, they're going to want to make sure of killing Catherine and myself and Catherine is geared up to try and use that proximity to apply the trackers to the assassin. You understand what that implies."

Wade nodded.

"First, the software and data needed to access the receiver is in this hand unit. Does the Kimmunicator have a USB adaptor?"

A line from the Kimmunicator snaked out and plugged itself into the unit. Wade glanced at the code. "That's good security! It would have taken me at least three minutes to break through if I'd known there was something there."

Ron butted in. "He's not joking, either."

"I'm certain of that. I'm also certain that that puts it beyond our opponents."

"The second thing?" queried Wade.

"Is there anything you can do to simulate Catherine well enough to fool a killer?"

Wade paused then shook his head. "Not in the time available. You can disrupt a hologram too easily."

Patrick thought for a moment. "Mrs Dr Possible, is there any reliable way of temporarily suspending the death process? I know that people whose core temperature plunges fast can survive without oxygen or a heartbeat for tens of minutes."

Ann considered this but shook her head. "It's not reliable and even if it worked for some things, there are many things nobody can cure. Anything that's possible is possible for a Possible, but that leaves far too much in this context. Is there any other way?"

Patrick turned to the Kimmunicator. "The tracking devices are transparent and use an impact adhesive. They have to be placed on the killer in a way they won't detect and at a time they won't detect. Catherine's plan is that he's least likely to notice when he's killing her. She's up close and he's busy."

"Why impact adhesive?"

"A real pain to remove when stuck and no stickiness until firmly applied - makes it easy to carry around."

"How much force do you need to apply?"

Patrick told him. Wade looked thoughtful.

"And why does she need to be killed?"

"If they're not convinced we're both dead, they won't leave. One of us needs to get up close and she has the skill and strength."

Catherine looked up with blazing eyes. "And I'm not giving dad the chance. This one is mine."

Patrick shook his head. "It has to seem to be her and it has to be convincing enough for the assassin to go back to Ann Dromeda. It does not technically have to actually be her, that isn't a requirement, but she will do this if we don't find an alternative."

Ron had a question. "Why do the tracking?"

"If the killer is still here, they might not limit themselves to us. After all, a teen hero or a vengeful family could follow them when they get the job done."

Ron gulped. "Oh..."

Kim looked anxious. "What stops them from killing my family anyway?"

"Ann Dromeda likes things to look like accidents, natural disasters, and so on. Fewer questions. Killing you would raise a lot of questions and get a lot of attention. As long as they think it's not worth it, you're probably safe."

"Probably?"

"Best I can do, I'm afraid. The best hope is to shut down the operation completely so that there's no threat at all, and that requires the tracker."

Kim could see Catherine suppressing the horror behind a resignation and a firm belief that she had to be the one to buy Team Possible both time and information. She wished she could reach out and take the burden away or fix things or... or... anything but this. To have suffered such desperate living - homeless and in fear, to then undergo such horrible tragedy and pain, and to have everything she had left taken from her just as she was starting to heal... No individual should go through that, let alone a child, although she knew it happened around the world daily.

Jim and Tim, who had been hiding in a corner spoke up.

"I know!"

"No, I know!"

They both spoke together. "There is a way to do this where nobody gets killed!"

Meanwhile, in a massive lair hidden inside a dormant volcano, several figures walked towards a meeting room. Energy use was minimal to reduce the risk of detection. Meta-materials coated the outside, converting the energy signature of the lair to something closer to natural. Being a volcano, the energy was easily masked.

"Well?" Ann Dromeda demanded, her face - already scarred by mystical symbols - looked more threatening and terrifying than usual.

"We've located them and we intercepted a communication to the hospital that a derelict house is going to be used as a makeshift field hospital for both of the surviving Duncans. We can eliminate them in one go."

"And the tablets?"

Their energies have been detected but their position has not been fixed yet. Once there's no possibility of anyone else retrieving them, we will be clear to retrieve them."

"Very well. This has to be done right, this time."

"I have sent twenty guards and Fenric. That should suffice."

Ann Dromeda thought about this. "Interesting choice. Not very discrete, though."

"There's a teen 'hero' involved. She is protective of her family. A weakness. This will be discrete. As long as she feels they are safe if she gets uninvolved, she won't. She's a minor celebrity and if she doesn't get uninvolved, it is going to get messy. Terror is the easier option."

Ann nodded. "Just so long as you understand the price of failure."

The man's eyes glowed green as he laughed. "Failure, as those Americans say, is not an option."

Outside the ruined house, two figures stood. The man with a stave, the girl unarmed. Stood is perhaps the wrong word. They fought as though their lives depended upon it. An apt phrase, in this case, because they did.

Shego was watching with admiration and a little fear. Catherine did not fight by the Way of Kimmie, Catherine was not concerned with justice or capture. To judge from one oddly-angled combatant on the ground, she was not concerned with the well-being of backs or necks, either. This was no quarter given and none taken fight to the death against horribly unequal odds. Twenty versus two. The man was not as impressive, closer to Ron in ability but just about able to fend off three at a time. Too bad there were ten trying to murder him. He had so far defeated none. The girl, though, had a growing pile of unconscious bodies with a few corpses thrown in. One of them literally.

Shego resisted the urge to tell Kim, lying on the ground next to Shego, that this was real fighting. Glancing at Kim was enough to convince her that Kim was just as impressed but utterly horrified.

Kim leaned closer to Shego. "Did Drakken add the fighting skill or violence?"

Shego gestured no. "That all comes from the girl."

Kim considered this and was going to say more when a large man in black body armour. The man gestured that the man with the stave should be grabbed. This was quickly accomplished.

The new man turned to Catherine and sneered. "Surrender now and I'll only kill you two. Refuse and I'll destroy this entire town."

The new man radiated evil. Had anyone a device capable of measuring it, they'd find that this was actually happening. He had a mystical mark on his face that radiated energy of a kind that could only be called evil.

The girl glared, backed off and faced the newcomer. "And how do I know you won't do that anyway?"

"You don't, beyond knowing we don't publicise."

Catherine considered and, much to Shego's disgust, surrendered. Shego knew the plan and knew the threat wasn't idle, but hated the very idea of giving in.

Catherine let herself be led to the newcomer. Neither Shego not Kim expected what happened next. Her hands were bound, she was stripped of her clothes and an ignited blowtorch was placed on a cradle along with an assortment of knives, gloves with spikes in the palms and other implements of torture.

At that point both the watchers looked away. The screams of agony didn't start for another five minutes but continued for another fifteen before breaking off suddenly.

Shego glanced back and wished she hadn't. Catherine's body had been largely destroyed and her severed head was now held by her assailant. Judging from a few details, Catherine had probably been raped as well. She hated Kimmie, but as a rival on opposite teams. Not like this.

The man had died a cleaner, but only slightly less brutal death. His guts had been ripped out and thrown into the ground before he, too, had been beheaded. Marginally more deserved, thought Shego, as he hadn't been as talented.

She heard Kim throw up as quietly as possible, suggesting Kim had seen too.

Those guards who were standing left. The man shot the rest through the head. Messily, making recognition impossible thought Shego.

Once the armoured man had left, Shego and Kim returned to the others. Kim was shaking badly and Shego actually had to help her at times. Patrick was crouched down near a complex piece of electronics. Catherine was next to a similar device, receiving CPR.

"Did it work?" Kim asked, after pulling him up on the Kimmunicator.

"I'm tracking the signal and it's going strong. It's moving north-west of you."

Kim breathed and took one of her mother's patent anti-trauma pills. "I may need another."

"Now, Kimmie, you have to build a resistance to severe trauma, you can't depend on medicine."

Kim nodded, agreeing but privately thinking that it was very, very unlikely she would ever experience anything like this again unless she became a mercenary.

"What happened to Catherine?"

"The feedback from whatever she suffered caused her heart to stop. I assume that was from whatever killed the replicant."

Kim decided against discussing the systematic physical and sexual trauma. At least, not until her mother was older.

"Where's Ron?"

"He's on sedatives after hearing the screams."

Shego strolled over. "I want my pay and under the circumstances make it double!"

Kim gestured to two crates. One marked "Drakken", which Drakken was already exploring. The other was marked Shego.

Drakken became aware he was noticed and came over. "The twins were an irritant and kept modifying the stuff I made. I was also dragged away from important world-dominating work. However, your recognition of my superior intellect and generous donation of money and some of Dr Possible's work will suffice I suppose. Just don't keep expecting me to keep bailing you out!"

Shego grimaced. Drakken was going to be more insufferable than usual for a long time. However, as she looked through her own crate, she'd been paid handsomely for her part in threatening Dr D into coming here, working with the twins and producing clone-like creatures whose senses and muscles were related over to the brains of the people they were replicas of. She'd heard the word "avatar" and thought it sort-of fit.

She had not expected the senseless, gratuitous violence after the surrender. oh, her dreams started at R and worked their way up, and they usually involved the torture (amongst other things) and eventual death of Kim Possible, but those were her dreams, her fantasies, something she would do and love every second of it. It was not for others.

Kim needed someone to work with who wouldn't get her killed (yet). Blunder boy was out of the picture. Catherine was supposed to be dead and needed to stay dead for now. Shego considered her for a moment, excellent fighter, a little too obsessed with dying perhaps, too dangerous to have as an enemy, totally out of the picture for right now.

Shego grumbled. She hated to admit it, but she was the only person qualified. However, she wanted triple danger money, the right to leave if it got too dangerous, and total authority. She couldn't see Kim ever agreeing to such terms.

Patrick watched as Catherine was taken away by stretcher to the field hospital. She was drifting in and out of consciousness but breathing on her own. He wondered how much of her shattered mind was left and the morality of forcing life onto someone who was unlikely to want it.

Not that he was in much better shape. He was in a great deal of pain and was grateful when the medics came back to assist him in as well.

Wade was monitoring the signal, the attackers were unlikely to detect the trackers as they didn't try to transmit long distances, and all evidence pointed to the deception working. It was now a matter of whether the trickery had been worth it.

Shego drifted up to Patrick, now in his hospital bed. "I'm taking the princess to the dungeon."

Patrick was aware of the multitude of meanings in that. "There's a stealth aircraft on the runway here. That way, you don't have to tip anyone off that you're working with your enemy."

Shego paused. "You know, that's almost not a bad idea."

"You know, that was almost a compliment."

"You don't mind working with evil people? I am evil, you know."

"You like a real challenge and you're not fussy about who provides it as long as it's worthy of you. I don't see that as good or evil, but if you like calling yourself evil, I'll try to remember that."

Shego blinked. He wasn't scared, revolted, horrified, disgusted - or, indeed, craving, lustful or any other emotion she'd seen in people of all types and beliefs. This was a new one. She didn't agree with him, at least entirely, about her motives but as long as he didn't try to convince others she wasn't evil, she'd be happy enough. Sneering not entirely convincingly, she left.

In the next room, Patrick knew medics were fighting furiously to keep Catherine alive, as her heart had stopped again only moments after entering the building. The will to live is important and he feared hers had been as destroyed as her replica.

In a third room, Dr Ann Possible was changing into her mission outfit. Ron couldn't go and no way was her daughter going to try to solo this. This wasn't about pride, dignity or even personal survival. Personal survival was at risk in every adventure Kimmie had, but she was competent enough to understand the risks and deal with threats. She knew it was more likely than not that Kim would die before her, but that wasn't a certainty. If she tried to solo this, it would be. But only by hours, as Ann had no illusions about the reprisals that would follow. Knowing the twins were in just as much danger convinced her that this mission was going to need an extra edge.

She followed Kim to the aircraft that they were going to take to the enemy base and entered via the bomb bay doors. It wasn't until she sat down and buckled up that she realized who the pilot was. 'Well, this should be exciting, at least", she thought.

Kim climbed in through the cockpit door and strapped in. Shego took off. Perhaps launched is a more accurate term. The forces hit 3g as the plane climbed insanely rapidly, before Shego loosened the throttle a little and kept speeds barely subsonic until they reached the coast before hitting the throttle again until they were cruising at Mach 5.

"I haven't had this much fun since the last time your dad took me on that roller-coaster, Kimmie!" Ann laughed.

Kim blanched. "Mom! This is far too dangerous! Shego, we have to go back!"

"No way, princess!" Shego snarled. "We wouldn't have the fuel to then complete the journey, and our surprise would be gone by the time we refuelled".

Ann also chimed in. "If we fail, everyone at home will be dead within hours. Dead here or there doesn't matter, but we've a better chance of not being dead if there's more of us."

"Who else came along?" Shego asked. "I don't care which of you die or when, but I need to make sure we have the fuel."

"Just me", Ann replied.

Shego grunted and adjusted the speed. "I hope you fight well enough to make it worth carrying you."

Ann could only hope the same. She was decent, but no expert, preferring brain to brawn. Here, there was no telling brain would matter at all.

Wade had fed the distance, direction and altitude data to the Kimmunicator screen, so Kim could navigate as needed. So far, there had been no problem. But, so far they'd been outside enemy airspace and they had no idea where that would begin. Assuming the enemy had air defences. If you're trying to stay invisible then active air defences weren't a smart move.

Shego continued on the path, ignoring the occasional inquiry. Nobody could catch up, if she pushed the aircraft further, and only a tiny number of nations could keep up as it was. As none of those were anywhere close, she considered the situation to be under control.

Still, Global Justice did make a careful note of a heavily cloaked aircraft of unfamiliar design at high speeds travelling without proper authority or credentials. They pointed a spy satellite in its direction and monitored it remotely.

"Ok, we're just about on-target", Shego called out.

"Where do we land?", asked Kim.

"We don't. We haven't the fuel, there's no runway and that would make us too easy to track. We'll slow down to the point the escape systems work, then we eject. I'll program the autopilot to speed back up and continue going. Get your helmets on, or don't. If you want to die now, that's your problem."

Kim and Ann hurriedly put their helmets. They'd been wearing their flight gloves for some time.

There was a terrific bang and three supersonic ejector seats blasted out from the cockpit. The initial drag chutes deployed automatically for each of the seats once it had stabilized.

Down to subsonic, the drag chutes were cut and the three descended, waiting to deploy their chutes until as late as possible, hoping the chutes wouldn't fail on them.

Kim had a scare, her main chute initially failed but the backup worked. Close, maybe too close, to the ground…


	3. Going Underground

Kim hit the tree canopy, which slowed her fall a bit. Her parachute was ripped to shreds, though, and her fall continued. Next, she hit lower-lying trees on the edge of the clearing she had been aiming for, before finally ending up in a marsh. She felt utterly disgusted and disgusting, but she found she'd escaped without so much as a bruise.

Shego was nearby, removing her chute. "Always trying to show off, princess!" she mocked.

Ann Possible landed deep in the clearing, unbuckled and jogged over to see if Kim was ok. "Don't give me scares like that!" she breathed in relief.

Shego scowled. "Your precious princess was in no danger."

"I didn't think she was, but the two for one sale on those mission clothes was over and you know who she'd be asking for money if they got ruined."

Shego shook her head. "Enough! Kimmie, you saw the fighting with that replicant. You'll have to give up on the goody two shoes right now. We won't be offered a second chance and they're not like Drakken. They won't leave you tied up while they gloat. They will do the sorts of things you saw. I'm not fighting in this if that's the likely result."

Kim understood Shego's point of view, but also understood this was an attempt to push her into far darker paths than she had any intent of going on.

"I'll do whatever I have to to beat them, but you remember what Patrick said when Drakken was producing the replicants. The shrines talked of getting power from terror, pain and death. We don't want to be making them stronger, that really would lead to us being defeated."

"Yeah, right, you believe that nonsense?"

Kim paused, but Ann Possible took over. "This cult obviously does, which means that if we kill them, they'll be braver. However, if we stun them, they'll think themselves weaker."

Shego mulled this over. It was the thought process of a lunatic, but as Shego felt the Possible family were half lunatic, Shego had to consider the possibility that this was a valid interpretation. Besides, if it was true and she obtained the secret, she could let her sadistic streak out a bit more. It would make her more formidable. If it didn't work, she could still have some fun.

"Perhaps. But if I decide to eliminate someone, you two back off."

Kim and Ann glanced at each other. They needed Shego, and Shego knew it. There wasn't time for debate and the situation in the base might make all argument superfluous anyway.

"You do what you need to do."

"I was planning on it. Second thing, we scout. If there are multiple entrances, we should attack by different ones. Close but different. That way, they can't just bomb that exit and have done with it. Anyone got a problem with that?"

Ann spoke up. "That's an excellent idea!"

Shego blinked. Mrs Dr Possible hadn't been sarcastic or obsequious. That had been a genuine compliment. It wasn't often she got those, particularly from a designated foe whose intelligence, she reluctantly admitted, was actually quite considerable.

"This way then."

The three of them moved in the direction the Kimmunicator indicated the beacon was still transmitting, with Shego in the lead.

"Stop!" Kim shouted.

Shego snarled. "Why? Got a stone or a frog in your shoe?"

Kim moved a foot and a half in front of Shego. She had been right, it wasn't a trick of the light.

"Tripwire."

Kim picked up a rock and threw it into the ground just across from the tripwire. The rock, and two feet of ground either side fell into a pit with spikes at the bottom.

Shego stood, arms folded. "Finished?"

"You very nearly were. If you'd fallen face-first onto that trap, you'd not be able to stop yourself landing on those spikes."

Shego smirked. "Do you want to lead?"

Kim wondered if Shego intended for her to land on any future spikes. It took every ounce of will-power to not grab control from this lunatic, but she needed Shego to be committed.

"You can lead. There is one thing I'm still unsure about."

"Only one? What?"

"Why you are helping. And don't say the money, you could have stolen that in an afternoon."

Shego pondered. You're mine, she thought, but this was probably not the ideal place to explain that, given Kim's mother was capable of giving her a flying kick into the pit.

"Insurance. Any threat so big that you'd actually beg me for help with is a threat so big that it won't tolerate anything else."

Kim blinked. Beg? The tweebs... They must have simulated her image when they called Shego. She must remember to beat them up before thanking them.

It took about twenty minutes to reach the hillside. Other than the beacon, nothing indicated anything unusual about it. A further thirty minutes of searching yielded four concealed entrances. Scanning the entrances showed tunnels leading down, so no possibility of breaking in through the roof.

Kim handed Shego a large pack of plastic explosive and some detonators, then set to work rigging up a shaped charge on the entrance she had selected for not going through. This was to show confusion over who had entered where, dividing any defences.

On the entrance she did want to use, she asked Wade to scan and open the lock, as it was purely electronic.

Within seconds it was done. Seconds later, she remotely detonated the explosives on the other door. She didn't know what Shego was doing, but hoped she had timed her entrance by the explosion.

As a matter of fact, Shego had. She'd used just enough explosives to smash open a door and she entered through it. If the defenders thought explosions were a decoy, there would be much less trouble this way.

Shego travelled maybe half a mile on the downward slope beyond the door. So far, nothing. No alarms that she could hear, no running feet. Concerning but not devastating. Her energy blasts could take care of most ambushes. She observed that the lights were bright in the tunnel, maybe indicating minimal lighting or darkness in the base. That would leave anyone entering totally exposed to any defences. She wondered if Kimmie had figured that out.

As she reached the final corner, she saw what she expected - total blackness. That meant a welcoming committee. She smiled inwardly. She was going to give them something to welcome. She had brought along a few of Drakken's bombs, plus a few empty spheres. The bombs would come in handy later. She packed a sphere with high explosives, some flash powder plus detonator, then threw it hard down that last stretch, throwing an energy blast at the lights. Getting back round the corner, she waited until she was rewarded with a powerful shockwave and the screams of the injured and dying. Her eyes were only slowly adjusting to the dark, but they would have a hard time seeing her if she acted fast. Their own night vision would be temporarily lost from the flash powder.

Not one to waste an opportunity, she ran as swiftly as she dared down the remaining passageway, entering what seemed to be a large cavern. Wounded guards struggled to get weapons ready. Her energy blasts, intensified by her anger, eliminated them without mercy.

Now the alarms sounded.

In the other tunnel, Kim and Ann had waited. They'd known a tempestuous Shego would help matters. As soon as the alarm sounded, they rolled smoke bombs and a concussion grenade into the cavern, paused to let the weapon fire identify where the guards were. The concussion grenade only stunned a few, but it was an opening. Dividing the remaining guards between them, they silently ploughed their way through the foe until there was nobody left standing. Conscious of Shego's warning about guards re-entering the fray, they'd compromised on the ethical issues by breaking arms and legs even amongst the defeated. Those could heal, just not quickly enough to return to the fight. This had required putting on knuckle dusters, weapons they personally abhorred but saw as an alternative to Shego's murderous philosophy. The weapons had been supplied by Shego, just in case. It was possible there were more severe injuries, but they lacked the time to check.

Scrambling over the makeshift defences, they headed around the periphery to the entranceway for the door they'd blown up. Sure enough, there were lots of guards there, waiting. Smoke bombs and hand-to-hand combat left these guards in no better shape than the last lot. Kim hoped this was enough to maintain any confusion amongst the defenders.

They continued around to the next entrance, which was unguarded. Advancing towards the centre, they realised they were getting close to an underground aircraft hanger. It didn't take long to find the fuel tanks and conceal explosives there. This part of the base had few guards, which suggested the guards were concentrating around where the attackers were supposed to be.

Occasionally, in the distance, they'd see green glowing plasma and explosions, followed by terrified screams. That was probably another reason for so few guards.

They rigged a few charges on a couple of aircraft, before running towards the action. Shego must not, under any circumstances, get captured.

Once well clear of the hanger, the explosives were detonated. The chain of explosions rocked the whole of the cavern and, from the sounds of it, brought down some of the roof. If that didn't help Shego, nothing would.

Shego found herself face down on the floor, a thin layer of rubble on top of her. Her ears were ringing so much she was unsure if her eardrums were intact. Incoming fire had been virtually zero for a while, as the defenders tried to get better positions. She wasn't quite sure what had happened, except that behind her was a distant fire of gigantic proportions and the stability of the cavern had been compromised. She suspected Kim was to blame.

Ann Dromeda's room was a mess. A large amount of the ceiling was now floor. She, herself, was looking around, disgusted. She gathered the talismans of power, one for siphoning the negative energy of those near her, one for prophecy and one for mind control. The incomplete talisman of immortality was left. Leaving the room, she headed towards the battle. It didn't matter whose negative energy she stole, she became more powerful. She would win by default.

As she approached the first battle scene, she saw a woman in green and black hurling plasma bolts everywhere. The air was thick with impending death. Breathing in, Ann Dromeda sucked that death into her, along with the anger, jealousy and rage of the woman. Power! Such power! A slight green aura started emanating from around her, as the woman collapsed, totally drained of everything that kept her going and kept her from hiding in herself.

Ann Dromeda glanced at Shego. Down and out for now, perhaps an amusing toy later. She seemed to have the stamina to last maybe even a few weeks of entertainment.

A metal sphere landed at her feet. It exploded, sending Ann Dromeda flying backwards. Her energy had absorbed the blast, but she was almost ordinary again. A woman and a girl advanced on her. She flew into an attack frenzy, but whichever one she attacked was able to dance away with little effort whilst the other landed blow after blow.

This was not easy for Kim, a grossly unfair fight. Well, unfair except the enemy had superhuman strength and speed, albeit only marginally superhuman. She was going to be a mass of bruises with some Kim in between them after this.

The battle raged for well over an hour, a war of attrition that saw Ann collapse exhausted and injured before Kim landed the decisive blow. Ann Dromeda was down but quickly healing. Kim ripped the talismans from her, and Ann Dromeda fell back, defeated.

Kim rushed to her mother, who was semi-conscious. Not certain of the ethics of this, Kim placed the talisman that had glowed when Ann Dromeda was healing over her mother's neck. The talisman glowed again and Ann's injuries started to heal, fixed by the suffering of others. Kim decided her mother probably shouldn't get told about that.

Shego had managed to work her way over to Ann Dromeda. Picking her up, she threw her onto a protruding metal spike in a burning, collapsed structure. Ann Dromeda weakly screamed in agony from both impalement and the fire. The rush of torment poured into Ann Possible, who began to recover consciousness.

Kim rapidly removed the talisman and threw it and the mind control talisman into the fire.

Shego barely noticed, enjoying the smell of the seared flesh of someone who could have killed her. She waited until she was satisfied Ann Dromeda had cooked enough, then used plasma blasts to smash the skull open and send brain matter everywhere.

Kim looked on, wordless, before trembling a little. If Shego ever went solo, Kim could expect no more mercy than that.

Shego's evil smile confirmed her fears.

Ann wandered over to her daughter and looked at the talisman. "What's that?"

"Something that's supposed to tell us about the future. The man who murdered the replicants? I haven't seen him. And he had a talisman for stealing power, too. We need to finish this."

Ann nodded. Kim put on the talisman and thought about the man. The image came up quickly and Kim nearly gagged. The man had been disembowelled over a tank of piranhas. He was still alive, but had no healing amulet and would have been beyond its capabilities in any case. Kim saw that it was some of his agony that had healed her mother. It hadn't been necessary healing, just useful, but they could leave the sooner for it.

She shuddered, realizing that the great fight between good and evil had a lot to do with convenience.

She then thought of Catherine, hoping she had survived, having been placed in peril unintentionally. Catherine was in intensive care and the doctors looked grave. Kim floundered for the talisman that could heal, then realized she had destroyed it. Besides, feeding off suffering in hospital would make things worse for many more.

Removing the amulet, she pulled out her Kimmunicator.

"Wade? I'm going to need a ride."


End file.
